design elements - San Jacinto Texas Historic District

VEGETATION OF THE COASTAL PRAIRIE PROVINCE OF THE SAN JACINTO RIVER
At the time of European sett lement, the coastal province of the area
between San Jacinto and the Gulf of Mexico was low, fl at, and everywhere
vegetated by prairie. The water table was at or near the surface in most
places, but in some areas, where the land undulated to form low mounds,
there grew copses of open-grown trees, mostly oaks, a few pines. A
few of the last remnants of this coastal vegetation is still extant at the
Armand Bayou Nature Center, in Pasadena, Texas. For the thousands
of years prior to Western sett lement, this vegetation was sustained at a
fecund, maximum biodiversity by occasional grazing and regular fi res set
by the native peoples. Overgrazing, fi re suppression, and various forms
of development have all but obliterated the once beautiful and unique
landscape of this area. Although there is some burning at the Armand
Bayou preserve, if it’s combustible tracts were burned annually, it would
represent the San Jacinto area as among the more fecund, unique, and
beautiful landscapes of the coastal plain of the Gulf of Mexico.
The verges with the estuaries along the San Jacinto and smaller drainages
were treeless marshes, infi nitely enervated by shallow, narrow, estuarine
channels. Those wetlands most dramatically infl uenced by salt-water
tides are characterized by fringes or fl ats of Smooth Cordgrass (Spartina
alternifl ora) and or Black Rush (Juncus roemerianus). Tule (Typha domingensis)
is the common catt ail. On the more subtle rises more under the infl uence
of fresh water fl owages from the hinterland are formed brackish marshes
and wet meadows of Marsh-hay Cordgrass (Spartina patens), along with
scatt erings of grasses and rushes such as Saltgrass (Distichlis spicata),
Sea Club Rush (Bulboschoenus robustus), Sword Grass (Schoenoplectus
americanus), California Bulrush (Schoenoplectus californicus), Needlerush
(Juncus eff usus) and Seashore Paspalum (Paspalum vaginatum). Such
marshes are punctuated with the yellow fl owers of the low subshrub, Sea
Oxeye Daisy (Borrichia frutescens) or the purple-fl owerd Seaside Gerardia
(Agalinis maritima). Gulf cordgrass (Spartina spartinae) is also widespread
in the coastal prairies, most usually situated on the interfaces between the
marshes and the low rises. Typical of the area is the shrub or small tree,
Sea Myrtle (Baccharis halimifolia) and the bushy perennial Marsh Elder (Iva
frutescens). The tidal fl ats are characterized by curious succulents such
as the glassworts (Salicornia bigeelovii and Salicornia virginica), along with
Vidrillos (Batis maritima).
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These watery sloughs were the spawning areas of the countless millions
of fi sh that inhabited the western districts of the Gulf of Mexico. The
marshes, prairies, and oak groves were the much sought-after growingseason
homes of countless birds, many of whom had wintered in the
Yucatan and other subequatorial districts.
Most of the province was overlain by prairies dominated by warm-season
grasses and wildfl owers, which passed gradually into the estuarine
marshes. Wildfl owers and perennial grasses and sedges of the area were
numerous and profuse throughout the prairies. In those areas that received
regular fi re along with light grazing there were as many as twenty or more
diff erent fl owering species in just a few square feet of area---each such
small area unique in composition even from those nearby. The beauty of
the warp and weft of life was indescribable. Many of these fl owering plants
are of ornamental quality and a few are available in local nurseries. The
U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service and U. S. Geological Survey have described
these coastal prairies most beautifully in an article entitled, Paraise Lost.
[htt p://library.fws.gov/pubs/paradise_lost.pdf]
ECOLOGICAL RESTORATION
Historically, there were probably 700-800 vascular plant species native to
the San Jacinto area. If an ecological restoration were to be att empted as
a landscape feature, it is from among these species that the restoration
should consist. Most will not be available in the nursery trade, so the seed
will have to be secured from the few local remnants, in consilience with a
seed-collecting protocol as presented by the sponsor of the remnant. Most
perennial beds have plants in drifts on 12-24” centers. Most of the native
perennials are interdependent on from 10-30 diff erent species per quartermeter
square, along with an array of insects and soil fungi. Consequently,
many of these species will not last even fi ve years as perennial plantings in
urban and suburban contexts. Insofar as management and maintenance is
concerned, there can be no successful natural restoration without the use
of regular applied landscape fi res.